The present invention relates to an infant care apparatus and, more particularly, to an improved means of constructing a double walled door for use with an infant care apparatus.
In the use of infant incubators, there are normally provided, doors, or even sides or ends that are comprised of double walls, that is, the sides or doors are comprised of two generally planar walls that are spaced from each other so that a path is formed between the walls for the passage of heated air.
While the use of such double walled sides or doors are advantageous to provide a passage for the heated air to thus reduce the radiant losses of the infant, there is a problem in the use of that construction in that the double walls must be easily disassembled so that the inner passage for the heated air can be cleaned. Thus, it is important that the double wall construction be structurally strong to maintain the integrity of the particular door or side and yet be easy to be disassembled by the user since the inner surfaces of the walls must be cleaned often by the user.
An example of one of the double walled infant incubators is shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,936,824 of Koch et al. In that patent, there is a double walled door along one lateral side of the infant compartment and the heated air passes up through that door, around the interior of the incubator and downwardly through a double wall at the other lateral side of the incubator. The heated air, therefore, passes through the passageway formed between the double walled construction of the door as well as the other portion of the incubator. Thus, in the Koch et al patent, the heated air is passed from the convective heating system beneath the infant compartment upwardly to pass through the double walls to provide heat to the infant.
Certainly, it can be seen in the Koch et al patent, the passageways that are formed intermediate the double walls of each door can become contaminated and must be cleaned from time to time. As also can be readily appreciated, due to the closeness of the walls, the interior surfaces cannot be effectively cleaned as is and thus, it is necessary to separate the walls by removing one of the walls to effectively carry out that cleaning process.
As such it is very advantageous to have the walls easily separated, without the use of tools or a particularly high level of skill in order to make the cleaning process relatively easy and, of course, it is also of great value to make sure that the walls can be disassembled and reassembled, preferably, without the use of any hardware that has to be removed to minimize the risk of inadvertently misplacing that hardware.
As another example of a double walled incubator construction there is U.S. Pat. No. 4,321,913 of Maluta et al, and which features a pair of cylindrical hood members that are rotated to open and close the hood. In the Maluta et al patent, however, the inner and outer walls are somewhat difficult to align and one wall is removed by removing an end extrusion and sliding one of the walls along a curved recess formed in the end walls. The overall procedure is quite difficult to be carried out, particularly with one person, and thus the removal and cleaning of the Maluta et al incubator hood is a substantial undertaking.
Thus, it would be advantageous to have a double walled incubator construction having a door, side or end that could be easily disassembled and reassembled in order to carry out a cleaning process on the incubator, preferably, incorporating an easy means of removing one of the walls of the double wall construction so as to make the internal surfaces of both the inner and outer wall fully accessible. It would be further advantageous for that incubator to be able to have one of the walls removable without the need to remove any separate hardware that could inadvertently become mislaid and not available for reassembly of the double wall construction.
As used herein, therefore, the description will refer to a door of an incubator, however, it being understood that while a door is preferred for the present double wall construction, the invention may equally apply to the side of the incubator including fixed sides or ends, it being only of importance that one of the walls be easily disassembled from the overall door or side.
Accordingly, the present invention relates to a double walled door or side that can be used with an infant incubator. As indicated, while there are advantages to the double walled construction having a flow path of heated air therethrough, the double wall construction must be capable of being easily disassembled in order to allow the cleaning of that passageway through the double walls.
In the present invention, therefore, there is a double wall door construction where the inner wall can be held firmly in position with respect to the outer wall so as to provide integrity to the door itself, yet, at the same time, the inner wall can be easily removed from the door assembly to allow the cleaning of the interior surfaces of the inner and outer walls.
In accordance with the present invention, the inner wall is hingedly secured, preferably at its lower edge, to a special hinge having a pair of sockets. In the preferred embodiment, there are two hinges, however, there may be only one hinge used or some number in excess of two. The hinge sockets receive tabs formed at the bottom of the inner wall such that the inner wall can freely rotate while being retained within the sockets. There is a slot in each of the sockets oriented at a particular angular position about the sockets. The slots are sufficiently wide to allow the thickness of the inner wall to pass through the slots to remove the inner wall from the socket and, of course, remove the inner wall from the door assembly itself.
In the preferred embodiment, the slot is formed in the socket at about a right angle to the plane of the assembled double walls, that is, when assembled, the double walls are, obviously, parallel to each other in parallel planes. For removal of the inner wall, therefore, in the preferred embodiment, the inner wall can be rotated about ninety degrees with respect to the plane of the outer wall where the tabs at the bottom of the inner wall line up with the slots in the sockets so that the inner wall can be simply removed from the sockets since the width of the slots is preferably slightly wider than the thickness of that inner wall. Thus, when in the position parallel to the outer wall the length dimension of the tabs is longer than the width of the slots such that the inner wall is held firmly in position and by simply rotating that inner wall a predetermined angular rotation, the inner wall can easily be removed from its affixation to the outer wall.
Obviously, in the assembled position where the two walls are assembled to each other as in use, there needs to be some means to maintain the inner wall in the position parallel to the outer wall and to insure that the inner wall does not inadvertently rotate. Accordingly, further in accordance with the present invention, there are latches that secure the free end, or top end of the inner wall to the outer wall so that the double wall construction is held together for use with the incubator.
Thus, when in use, the walls are held firmly in parallel planes and for removal of the inner wall, it is only necessary to simply unlatch the top of the inner wall to free the inner wall to rotate about its bottom edge, pivotally secured to the outer wall. In the preferred embodiment, that inner wall is rotated about ninety degrees with respect to the outer wall, that is, the plane of the inner wall is moved to a position where it is at a right angle with respect to the plane of the outer wall, then remove the entire inner wall by pulling the tabs through the slots formed in the sockets. Assembly is also simply carried out by reversing the aforedescribed steps.
These and other features and advantages of the present invention will become more readily apparent during the following detailed description taken in conjunction with the drawings herein.